


Another Sort of Magic

by FoxLight



Category: The Last Unicorn - All Media Types, The Last Unicorn - Peter S. Beagle
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-27
Updated: 2014-07-27
Packaged: 2018-02-10 17:14:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2033292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FoxLight/pseuds/FoxLight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After sending a princess to Lir, Schmendrick is short one enchanted horse. Molly does not make him walk forever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Another Sort of Magic

**Author's Note:**

> A small scene set just after the end of the book.

It was an awkward sort of moment when Schmendrick finally ceased his laughter over the wayward princess. All throughout their song he kept giggling like a madman, his voice high and whimsical as they made their way through the orange sunlight. Tears, like crystals in a cave, nestled themselves at the edges of his eyes and threatened to fall at the passing of his humor, When he finally looked up to Molly both she and the cat--who was lazily napping in her lap--were sporting the same bewildered look.

“I can’t help it,” he explained in defense. “Everything is such a gas now that I’m back on borrowed time. The world is new and ridiculous.”

He received a derisive snort from the cat, and a flat-out giggle from Molly. “What are you on about?” Molly asked him from above, hair muffling her words as long strands thrashed in the dusty wind. 

Nothing was said for a long time; then, the magician looked up to see the traces of amusement peeking out from behind Molly Grue’s clear, deep eyes. “I’m not sure I can know.” He finally commented.

She laughed then, and he could not really tell all the reason why though he smiled at her all the same and turned to gaze over the deep, rolling hills and quiet forests that waited ahead. Far in the distance, a cluster of rain-clouds hung in heavy silence, swelling with the weight of their accumulating burden. Schmendrick nodded to prompt Molly’s looking, saying “but what is spring without a little rain, hmm?”

“Aye,” she spoke, “and we’ll no doubt see winter again. Even with the world having it’s unicorns again and shining brighter for it, we’re not to be without our darker days.” Her voice dropped to match the weight of her words. “Time’s still clawing at us all; even at you now.”

“Mmm, true, true, but you know what I say to that?” he asked in wistful tones, “I say that there is more beauty in a fragment of fleeting time than there is in a multitude of immortal years, and I say that time can’t have you yet, Molly Grue, because I have to have you first. We must create our own story; darkness and all .”

“And what if time’s already had enough of me?” She said in a foggy voice. Images from the Greenwood churned through them both.

“Impossible.” He huffed and his eyebrows rose to the heights of trees as his eyes closed pretentiously. “But if it has, well, then time will just have to play nice,” he said, quite seriously, “otherwise I’ll turn it into a trout and cast it into the nearest rain-puddle, ever to dream of mossy rocks and bubbling brooks."

“You couldn’t do that," she responded. The fragile, hopeful look that graced her eyes was enough to make Schmendrick stumble over his robes. Vulnerability made beautiful by Molly Grue; he should have known.

The magician faltered, and his mouth went as dry as a parrot's tongue. “ I, I...” He caught himself, “I’m Schmendrick the magician, greatest wizard who ever lived. I can do anything I please.”

Her cheeks turned the color of rosewood and she struggled to hide behind ashy tresses of yellow hair. “Oh, get on the horse already,” she said with vinegar in her voice, though it was softened by another feeling.

Schmendrick gave her a satisfied look and took her proffered hand. Up on the horse he went, and he could not help but to catch his nose in Molly’s sunlit hair as they rode off into the ending day. She smelled of sweet grass in the summer wind, of lilacs in the mountains, and later he would think of how that moment was significant, of how it felt strange and entirely new. Remembering it, as vividly as ever, as the moment he became enamored with another sort of magic entirely--a true magic that was bound by neither time nor place but by an energy that Molly Grue, and Molly Grue alone, could conjure up within him.


End file.
